Course of Empire

Stage 5: Desolation. Click through to see the rest of The Course of Empire.The Course of Empire, a five-part painting series by the 19th century Hudson River School painter Thomas Cole, illustrates the duration of a civilization from one vantage point. The five paintings, respectively entitled The Savage State, The Pastoral State, The Consummation of Empire, The Destruction of Empire, and Desolation, show different chronological stages of a piece of land. It starts as stormy a shore with little sign of human life. There is a group of presumably native hunters, but nature dominates the landscape. The next painting shows a more established human settlement. There are signs of architecture, recreation, and farming. The Consummation illustrates a civilization at its height. There are fountains, ornate decorations, and other signs of wealth and prosperity. The next painting illustrates the destruction of the city in the time of war. The sky and sea are stormy, and people are fleeing and panicking on shore. The beautiful structures from the previous painting are shown in ruins. Finally, the Desolation painting gives a glimpse of the ruined and abandoned city as nature starts to take over the land once again.
Cole's paintings illustrate some of Yi Fu Tuan's ideas about Time and Place. The Course of Empire, beginning and ending with stages lacking much human involvement, suggests a cyclical or circular view of time, where a place can be dominated by nature, then man, then nature, and so on. As the audience of the paintings, we have the rare and valuable experience of viewing one place over a long term period of time. In a sense, we "get to know" this place through Cole's 5 snapshots of moments that are decades or centuries apart. Photographs and paintings have undoubtedly taught us to experience places through imagery, but without any historic context or nostalgic attachment. The Course of Empire, like 5 lone frames from very long set of time-lapse photographs, gives us the depth of time, allowing for extra understanding of a place beyond what is visually apparent.